Radio station premieres fresh format: podcasting / Free-form shows take to Bay Area airwaves in KYCY experiment

Published 4:00 am, Tuesday, May 17, 2005

Podcasters took over a San Francisco radio station Monday, replacing traditional radio personalities like Don Imus with a homespun potpourri of shows featuring independent musicians, martini-making and mortality.

KYCY (1550 AM) became the first over-the-air radio station to convert to an all- podcast format, an attempt by radio powerhouse Infinity Broadcasting Corp. to capitalize on a new but fast-growing Internet phenomenon.

Infinity is marketing the low-rated station as "KYOURadio.com" and "Open Source Radio."

"It's a grand experiment," said Rob Barnett, Infinity's president of programming. "More than anything else, this is about opening up the gates and letting people inside a large broadcasting corporation to give (them) immediate access to the airwaves."

The term podcast, which refers to a way to create audio files that can be automatically downloaded from the Internet to an iPod or similar MP3 player, burst onto the Internet in September.

The KYCY podcasts were selected from a pool of about 500 that were submitted to Infinity after it announced plans to change formats last month.

The format premiered with a six-minute version of "Morning Coffee Notes" by software programmer Dave Winer, who created the tools that made subscribing to Web logs and podcasts possible.

Winer and the other podcasters aren't paid. But in an interview, Winer said he's excited that KYCY is showcasing the power of a medium that allows ordinary people to voice ideas instead of relying on the usual mass media sources.

"This gets more visibility for the idea of podcasting, which is what I really care about," Winer said in an interview. "The people listening to the radio represent a much greater resource than the people they put on the radio. "

During the day, the station aired podcasts that included an episode of "My Daily Commute," featuring a podcaster who ruminates about his mortality while driving to work; "Dragon Radio 008," a show about Asian music; and "Podman No. 1," a 45-minute show about cats.

Tom Taylor, editor of industry magazine Inside Radio, said KYCY and its predecessors have a long history of being used for experimental programming.

The podcast trial has received worldwide attention, but Taylor said it remains to be seen whether it will be successful or end up as "this year's hula hoop."

Don Imus fans, however, were irate they could no longer listen to his nationally syndicated show. Infinity has no immediate plans to move the Imus show to another of its stations.

Imus fan Ruth Roth called the switch a disaster, saying she plans to tune out KYCY.

"This morning around 6:30, they had a guy making martinis -- not what I needed at that hour," she wrote in an e-mail.